Vladimir Dahl Literary Museum

Birthplace of the great Russian lexicographer

Address Dahl St 12, Luhansk

The two-storey house at 12 Dahl Street is the birthplace of Vladimir Dahl (1801–1872), the Danish-Russian doctor, naval officer, and ethnographer whose four-volume dictionary remains a touchstone of Russian language scholarship. Dahl grew up here while his father worked as a doctor at the cannon foundry that gave Lugansk its start.

The museum, opened in 1986 on the second floor of the family home, holds first editions of the dictionary, Dahl's medical instruments, his correspondence with Pushkin, and exhibits on his time as a doctor in the Russo-Turkish War. The bronze statue of Dahl outside is the city's best-loved monument.

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A story
Vladimir Dahl spent over fifty years compiling the **Explanatory Dictionary of the Live Great Russian Language** — 200,000 entries, including thousands of regional words and proverbs he collected by stopping people in the street and asking what their words meant. His Lugansk pen-name was "Cossack Lugansky."

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